


Sandor Clegane and the Red Bird of Hogwarts

by SanSanFanFan



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, Hogwarts!au, kind of a ficlet, might be more to come
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-04-22
Packaged: 2018-03-24 23:19:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3788038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SanSanFanFan/pseuds/SanSanFanFan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Hogwarts!SanSan based on the headcanons of @dammitsandor and @autisticstannis on Tumblr about Sandor and Elia at Hogwarts.</p><p>Kind of a ficlet for now until I can find time to write more... ;D</p><p>SSFF xxxx</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“1… 2… 3… no! No!! Fuc- No! No! No! Don’t do that!”

He breathes out, getting a grip on his anger as the little red bird flies quickly up into the arching rafters of the classroom... and hides. He’s still in the duelling position, his dogwood wand gripped so tightly in his fist that his knuckles are white, but she’s gone.  She’s bloody well morphed _again_.  Gods damn it!

“Get down here, Stark!” He growls. The small red bird perches on a wooden beam, her wand still rolling on the floor below her, the ghostly pale weirwood a white line against the coal black flagstones of the defence against the dark arts classroom. The bird sings at him for a moment, but then she returns, landing in front of him and shifting back into the shape of a pale and frightened seventh year, her brand new uniform with a few new tears in it since the first time he noticed them a week ago.

“Pardonnez-moi Monsieur Clegane, mais j’étais effrayé…”

“I told you, I don’t speak French!” The girl almost shivers and he regrets shouting at her. Again.

She’s smart.  She has to be to have become an animagus at such a young age.  The sorting hat had dithered about the exchange girl for bloody long enough at the start of the year, and he suspects that was it choosing between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff for her.  But a puff she is now…  and one of _his_ bloody responsibilities.  But if she’s so damn smart why can’t she pick up duelling just like that? It aint so hard, but all she does is bloody well morph into that tiny bird, and then flutter off!

“Its bow, then one, two, three, _then_ bloody well cast!” His voice is rising again.  She’s near trembling.  He sighs. “Look.  I’m sorry.  But I just don’t get it.  I just don’t get why anyone would want to… bully _you_.  You’re different of course, and people don’t like different.  There’s the accent for one thing.  That you don’t know as much English as them.  And coming here after being at another school, joining when everyone already knows each other… and everyone has bloody friends already…”

He stops, she looks like she’s going to cry, and he wants to hex his own damn self!  Gods damn it! He shouldn’t be doing this! Even if he’s her head of house there are others on the faculty who could talk to her about this.  They’d be able to talk to her without fucking it all up, like he was.  He tries again…

“What I’m trying to say is… well… they shouldn’t be bullying _you_.  You’re pretty and-” He stops.  That was inappropriate.  _Really_ inappropriate!  But by the gods, if he’d been a seventh year and this slender red haired girl had arrived from Beauxbatons with that gods damned adorable accent…. Well, there wouldn’t have been and bloody tears on her clothes, or those bruises that she was hiding under that smart new blazer!  He’d have been following her about like a goddamned _dog,_ desperate to please her!

Instead he saw Sansa Stark alone, no one talking to her, let alone following her about.  She was alone in the courtyard as she hurried from class to class, head down and all that flowing auburn hair hiding that pretty heart shaped face and those seriously enchanting blue eyes.  She was always alone in the common room when he made his rounds as head of house, still studying hard when all the other Hufflepuffs had long since gone to bed.  Alone in his class when all the others paired up to practise their defensive spells and no one chose to partner her…

Maybe he was doing her no bloody favours by taking her under his wing to teach her to defend herself.  Maybe he was making things worse for her.  The other students might see her as his pet… his favourite…

“Merci, monsieur- Thank you Mr Clegane.  It has been hard to transfer here.  The exams are so soon.” Her voice is small, but it rings out like a sweet song in the echoing classroom.  Like birdsong.

“Are you lonely, Sansa?” He’s standing too close.  Too damned close.

“Non- no Mr Clegane.  The students are very friendly here.”

He frowns, that’s just not true.  Well, some of them can be.  He remembers his first day at Hogwarts and the beating he got from his brother for ‘daring’ to be sorted into Hufflepuff instead of Slytherin where Gregor was already in charge in all but name, and only a Fifth  year at that. And he remembers the girl who’d found him alone in a corner of the grounds, as close to the Forbidden Forest as he dared  to get back then, sitting on a tree stump and working out how to escape the next seven years of his life at Hogwarts.  An older girl, a prefect, a bright yellow badge on her blazer and a wide, friendly smile on her face. “Well, I’ve got to look after my little puffs, don’t I?” She’d said, even though at eleven he’d already towered over her.  No one could call him a ‘little puff’, not with his fucking burns and the reputation that the surname Clegane gave him.  Not with his quick anger and quicker fists… and later, his dangerous wand. No one could, except Elia.

And as if he’s summoned her, she arrives.

Only Elia bloody Martell could come to work at Hogwarts as the school nurse and still be the most fashionably dressed woman in the entire damn school.  Her long autumn yellow silk skirts swept the flagstones behind her as she made her way towards the frightened school girl and him.

“Madame Martell!” Sansa Stark warbles as the beautiful olive skinned woman approaches them, and Sandor thinks the Stark girl’s going to bloody well morph again and fly away in fright.  But she stays.

 “Mr Clegane.” Elia says formally.

“Madam Martell.” He’s gruff with her, but that’s never bothered Elia. “What brings you from the infirmary?”

“We had an appointment… but I see that you are busy?” There’s barbs in her words too.  An archness to them.  Gods, he’ll be justifying this for the rest of the bloody evening over dinner!

Out of the corner of his eye he sees Sansa blushing.   He knows that the hulking scarred man’s regular dinners with the beautiful matron who smells of healing spices and herbs had set the pupils’ tongues to wagging.  No doubt even the new girl has heard them, and roughly translated their no doubt crude comments into her tongue.  Usually he doesn’t care to explain what Elia means to him, but seeing Sansa’s curious eyes on the two of them- No!

“You are excused Sansa, go back to the common room.  And read chapter seven on defensive spells by the next class. We’ll go over them together after class is dismissed.” He means to be kinder, but his voice barks at her.  She nods, gathers her wand and her books to her chest, and runs from the room, her skirt flapping against those long, long legs…

Sandor turns back to Elia’s raised eyebrow. “What?!”

“Extra classes? _Alone?!_ That’s not clever Sandor-”

“You seen her bruises?! Gods damn it Elia!”

“I’m not saying its not _right_ , just not _clever_.” Elia sighs and quickly perches up on a desk as though she’s still the young girl he first met all those years ago. “I didn’t know about the bruises.  But I’ve heard things… worrying things.”

She looks fierce suddenly, and Sandor remembers that even that young girl, the too good to be true prefect, found ways to pay Gregor back for the bruises and cuts he gave Sandor.  The other kids used to dismiss her as weak because she was so often in the infirmary with this problem or that.  And it was true that Elia had never been _well_.  But all that time in the infirmary had been _educational_. Gregor was still paranoid about what he ate or drank.

“What have you heard Elia, out with it?!”

“She’s not always alone.  Joffrey Baratheon’s taken an interest in her.  They’re ‘dating’ according to the gossip among the common rooms.”

Sandor frowned, but tried to keep a greater irritation out of his voice.  Why did that bother him so much?  “So, some little Slytherin twerp asked her out…”

“Well, first off, no one dares go near her now that Joffrey has ‘chosen’ her.  Not even the other Hufflepuff girls.  And second….” She pauses, frowning. “Second, I’ve had more than a few students in my infirmary beds who have refused to say a gods damn bad thing about that boy. And yet he’s always around when they’re hurt-”

Sandor clenched his wand tighter. 

“I don’t have proof.  And Joffrey’s father is… influential.” Elia’s face is a stone wall, but her dark eyes as stormy as his own.

“But you know, don’t you, you just _know_ he’s hurting her!” Sandor barks, about ready to charge into the Slytherin rooms himself and pull the smirking blond boy from his bed.

“I _know_ , Sandor.” Elia whispers. “So if you want to keep training the girl… then I think you should.  But not _here_.  There’s plenty of forgotten rooms in the castle.  Remember the one we found hiding from Gregor that one time, the one that changes all the time depending on what you need?”

She pauses, and then that smile is back, that dark one that Gregor learnt to be wary of. “But _don’t_ just tell her how to faff and wave her wand about like some kind of fancy duelling wizard.” Elia folded her arms across her chest, defiant, and Sandor could almost see that yellow enamel badge that she had once worn, pinned now to her earth coloured jacket.  Elia Martell, Hufflepuff prefect. A mother hen to _all_ her little puffs.  A mother hen with steel spurs.

“Teach her how to _fight,_ Sandor _._ ”


	2. The Room of Requirement

_Elia_

As soon as she reads his note she knows her little puff is in deep, deep trouble. 

Not that she hadn’t already been worried for him, but for other reasons.  Sandor had vanished for two days without warning, leaving his students milling about his classroom door with nothing to go on but a hastily scribbled sign that literally barked out “Class Cancelled!” at the different years that came to read it.  And then there had been the reports in the Daily Prophet of dark shapes flying over London.  Whispers of green lights in the sky.  People going missing.  _Death Eaters_.

She’d feared he’d gone hunting again, grabbing his wand and a few supplies before dashing off like a hot headed fool… off to hunt Gregor... _again_.

But no, he’s back from wherever he’d taken himself, scribbling her a note on his Hogwarts crested vellum that flies itself to where she is still pouring over old herbology texts in the infirmary, the sun inching its way through the shutters after a long, long night.

_“Tonight. The room.  The Little Bird. And you. Just in case.”_

Oh _Sandor_ , she thinks with a sigh.  _Just in case._ If she asks him about what that means he’ll claim that they might need a healer on hand just in case he accidentally hurts the girl… because, in all honesty, the little thing’s not going to be able to hurt _him_.  But that’s not why he needs her there. 

A chaperone. 

Which might seem smart, it’s certainly cleverer than holding her back after his class to teach her duelling.  But she’s wondering who exactly she’s protecting if she goes. Exactly who it is who needs her stern eye upon.  Who it is who is at risk.

She meets Sandor the long hallway later, not going was never an option in fact, no matter her concerns about his interest in his ‘Little Bird’.  But to get there she’s had to extract herself from an awkward, one sided conversation with the Head of Slytherin about his latest book that she’s been promising to read for weeks.  Young girls nearby glare at as she tries to circumvent the admittedly handsome, golden robed man as he talks at her.   His grand tales of his adventures overseas facing dark creatures cause a stir in the hormones of the female population of Hogwarts every time a new, and rather floridly written, book comes out. And his poetry is worse.  But there is something about the professor of Divination that makes her go cold.  And it’s not even because Rhaegar is prone to pronouncing his knowledge of events after they happen in a bored supercilious tone. Although that is rather annoying…

“I’m afraid I am late for an appointment… which of course you already _know_.”

“I _know_.” He says simultaneously, then looks bemused at her snapping tone. 

And then he has to be satisfied with looking at her back as she rushes onwards to meet Sandor.  She finds him striding towards the left corridor where the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy trying to teach trolls ballet hangs.  On one shoulder he’s hefted an iron banded chest as though it weighs little, and the few pupils about are scattering before his path, staring stupidly at his damned scars. Oh Sandor.

She lengthens her stride to catch up with him, before pausing as he looks down at her, catching her breath.  He offers her his arm without words because he knows her well enough.   She clasps it, drawing nearer to him, using his strength no matter what the few remaining students might think of it. “Thank you Sandor.”

He grunts.  “The girl’s not here yet.”  He sounds disappointed.

The sick feeling that she got in her stomach when she read his note only deepens.  Maybe he shouldn’t be trying to help the Stark girl.  But she doesn’t say _that_ , not exactly. “Perhaps we should speak with Rhaegar…?”

“What will that flouncing fool do?”

“The Baratheon boy’s in his house-”

“Tell you what, we’ll talk to him, he can do bugger all about it, and then write a book about how he saved her, how’s that?”

She looks up at him, taking in the darkness in his eyes, the glare and sneer of his features. She’s never seen him like this about anything apart from Gregor. Never seen him… _care_ … so much.

“About fucking time.” He whispers hoarsely as the sound of running feet reaches them, and moments later the red haired Stark girl is racing towards them down the empty corridor, hair flying and trailing feathers behind her as her nerves bring out her animagus form. 

“Pardonnez-moi, mais-”

“No. No more ‘pardonnay-moi’.  You stop apologising!” Sandor barks at the girl and Elia frowns at him, removing her arm from his. Sandor’s surprised at her action until she starts to pace in front of the blank wall opposite the tapestry.  Well, just shouting at the girl isn’t going to help her!

The door emerges to the room they had discovered that wet Monday, so many years ago.  Gregor had found her, cornered her in the glasshouse where she was looking in on some Sunspear cuttings her brother had sent her from Dorne.  Gregor still had the black eye that Sandor had given him during the last Quidditch match that had faced the two of them off against each other.  Slytherin Beater, Hufflepuff Beater… ‘The Mountain’ and ‘the Hound’ the banners had called them.  Banners that had surrounded Elia in the stands as she cheered so very loudly for Sandor as he hunted down the bludger.  So loudly, that Gregor had noticed her. 

Running from the glasshouse through the torrential rain, breath sneaking out of tired and painful lungs, she’d run into Sandor who’d grabbed at her hand roughly, near carrying her with him through corridors and flights of stairs. To here, to this corridor… the sound of Gregor’s relentless march coming after them as Sandor had paced, desperately thinking of where they might go, where they might hide… until the door had appeared for them.  As it did now for her.

“What is this place… please?” The Stark girl clutches her books and her wand tighter to herself.

“Somewhere safe.” Sandor says deeply, and leads the way in, trusting that Elia’s needs will have shaped the room for them.

Elia sighs deeply as she sees the samovar waiting for her, set on a walnut table beside a velvet covered chaise longue.  She draws out a small stoppered bottle of water and a pouch of tea leaves and sets to work, as Sandor smiles wryly at her. “That bloody metal contraption.  That’s always bloody well here.”

“I’ll have you recall that you summoned the room the first time we found it, so you must have known that I needed it…”

“Aye, well, I suppose.  You _were_ soaked through, and shivering.” He easily places the heavy chest on the floor, ignoring how it jiggles and shakes.

Elia settles down on the couch as the steam begins to emerge from the metal boiler, curling her feet up under herself, not caring that the Stark girl has gone from staring at the vaulting room to sneaking glances at the two of them. She’s used to such looks. The odd pair that they make; the dark robed and scarred professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts and the shorter, slight woman with the curling deep brown hair of the South, has always drawn eyes.  But she notes that Sandor is looking at the Little Bird. Notes it and worries.

“Put yer books down.” He says gruffly and the girl darts to a table covered in books such as _the_ _Dark Arts Outsmarted_ and _Self-Defensive Spellwork_ and leaves her homework there too _._ “Stand here.  Draw your wand.”

The girl doesn’t question him and Elia wonders what she makes of him.  Sansa Stark has never asked for his help as far as she knows.  Sansa Stark barely speaks but to apologise or to excuse her mistakes. If Joffrey is behind her bruises and her fear… she isn’t saying.  What does she think Sandor wants to teach her?

It becomes obvious moments later as Sandor waves his own long dogwood wand towards the chest and it flies open.  The tumbling shape that darts out and hovers in front of the Little Bird has the weary Elia sitting up from her couch and gasping.  He wouldn’t try… _that_? Would he?!

“What is it Sansa? We covered them in class-” Sandor stands behind her, arms crossed as he considers the beast’s twisting shape.  It’s still deciding.  The girl must have many things it could choose.

“Bog… boggart, Monsieur Clegane.” Her voice is trembling, but nevertheless Sansa is pushing back at her sleeves, raising her wand.

“Aye.  A boggart.  Crafty bugger took me a while to track down in the deeper cellars, but I got him.”

There’s a flash of Joffrey, a sneering face below blonde hair for a moment, then there’s a more familiar hulking shape.  For a second Elia thinks the creature has picked up on her own near forgotten fear of the older Clegane brother, but its scarred face tells her that this is another of Sansa’s fears. Elia looks to Sandor, but if it upsets him, he doesn’t let it show.  And then there’s another man, older, stern looking.  “Shame” he says, “Shame”, in a voice that sounds French.  But then Joffrey’s back, forming completely and sneering at Sansa.

“Stupid girl.  Stupid, stupid little Frenchie. Of course I don’t fancy Margaery Tyrell.  I can’t help it if she’s smarter, and funnier, and prettier than you.  Or that she doesn’t make me angry like you do… I can’t help that, now can I?”

“What’s the spell, Sansa?!” Barks Sandor.  “How do you stand up to the little twerp?”

“Sandor…” Elia’s voice is full of warning.  This is a risky tactic.  But she had told Sandor to teach Sansa how to fight back.

Sansa’s sweet voice is barely audible. “Riddik… Riddikulus.” Her wand wavers towards the sneering Baratheon boy.

“Cast it then!”

“Sandor!”

“Riddikulus.” There’s very little effort behind it, but it works.  For a moment Joffrey is dressed all in motley like a jester or a fool, his face all painted and his hair standing up in spikes with bows.  Sansa laughs, and its beautiful.

“But, sir.  I do not understand?”

“Aye, maybe you won’t.  Till you see the little fucker again, and he aint so bloody frightening.” Sandor waves his wand to push the boggart back into the chest, but it turns on him, hissing through Joffrey’s wormy lips and refusing to budge.  Then it backflips, morphing into a raging ball of flames, that has Sandor stepping back, fear writ on his face for the girl to see.  Damn Gregor, damn him to all the hells!

Elia darts from the couch, ignoring her cast off shoes and gets between the Sandor, the girl, and the boggart.  It focusses on her, but before it can change she’s jabbing her juniper wand at it, forcing it back into the chest, and crashing the lid down on it with one bare foot.

“There!” She says with a great deal of satisfaction.  “And no one needed my medical help.”

Sansa is staring at the box, that jigs and shakes under Elia’s painted toes. “Thank you, Madam Martell.”

“Perhaps, Monsieur Clegane could return to defensive spells now, so that I may return to my tea.” She hides the weakness in her legs as she walks quickly to the couch.  Or at least she thinks she does, Sandor is still watching her with one eye as he walks the girl through her spells again.  

Elia wonders if she will need them or whether the amusing memory of Joffrey as a fool will break his hold on her entirely.  But watching Sandor training with the girl she remembers the boggart taking his shape.  Sansa would not be the first to fear her little puff.  But it’s not fear she sees on the girls face now as he makes her practice on a dummy.  It is more like determination and… something else…

Yes. Yes, she should stay while they practise.

_Just in case._


End file.
